Every site has it's own pre-season player rankings, almost all of which are based off of someone's subjective analysis and opinons. They may look at some stats, but alot of big time scorers end up on top, even though scoring is much easier to come by than blocks or steals. And if there are many categories a team is competing for, aren't good numbers across the board better than someone who just scores?

There's a way to account for both of these things. A Z-score (X-Mean/Standard Deviation) will give us a number of how well a player performed relative to all other players in a group for that stat. The key though, is that it standardizes the score on a scale of about -3.5 to 3.5. This allows to you to do this for all stats and simply combine them to find a Total Z-Rating that shows how complete/valuable a player is based on their last season.

Because it encompasses most of the stats tracked in a fantasy league, I used the NBA Efficiency rating to determine my population. I took the top 50 players, and shamelessly added in my favorite player, Kirk Hinrich (#62 eff).

So after plugging in some data and doing quick calculations, (ok, it took me almost 8 hours to do the whole thing in excel, I need some programming help), you can get the Z-scores for all the top 51 players (okay, top 50 in NBA Efficiency and Hinrich).

For example, the Z-scores for players for the Points category looked like this:

Player

Pts/Game

Z-Score

Kevin Garnett , MIN

21.8

0.2837

LeBron James , CLE

31.4

2.0069

Shawn Marion , PHX

21.8

0.2837

Elton Brand , LAC

24.7

0.8042

Kobe Bryant , LAL

35.4

2.7249

Dirk Nowitzki , DAL

26.6

1.1453

Dwyane Wade , MIA

27.2

1.2530

Allen Iverson , PHI

33.0

2.2941

Ming Yao , HOU

22.3

0.3734

Chris Bosh , TOR

22.4

0.3914

Paul Pierce , BOS

26.8

1.1812

Gilbert Arenas , WAS

29.3

1.6300

Steve Nash , PHX

18.8

-0.2548

Pau Gasol , MEM

20.4

0.0324

Tim Duncan , SAS

18.6

-0.2907

Marcus Camby , DEN

12.8

-1.3318

Andrei Kirilenko , UTA

15.3

-0.8831

Jermaine O'Neal , IND

20.1

-0.0215

Chris Webber , PHI

20.2

-0.0035

Jason Kidd , NJN

13.3

-1.2421

Lamar Odom , LAL

14.8

-0.9728

Dwight Howard , ORL

15.8

-0.7933

Chris Paul , NOK

16.1

-0.7395

Ray Allen , SEA

25.1

0.8760

Carmelo Anthony , DEN

26.5

1.1274

Chauncey Billups , DET

18.5

-0.3087

Vince Carter , NJN

24.2

0.7145

Richard Jefferson , NJN

19.5

-0.1292

Shaquille O'Neal , MIA

20.0

-0.0394

Tracy McGrady , HOU

24.4

0.7504

Brad Miller , SAC

15.0

-0.9369

Michael Redd , MIL

25.4

0.9299

Antawn Jamison , WAS

20.5

0.0503

Mehmet Okur , UTA

18.0

-0.3984

Gerald Wallace , CHA

15.2

-0.9010

Boris Diaw , PHX

13.3

-1.2421

Carlos Boozer , UTA

16.3

-0.7036

Jason Richardson , GSW

23.2

0.5350

Joe Johnson , ATL

20.2

-0.0035

Mike James , TOR

20.3

0.0144

Rashard Lewis , SEA

20.1

-0.0215

Baron Davis , GSW

17.9

-0.4164

David West , NOK

17.1

-0.5600

Ben Wallace , DET

7.3

-2.3191

Zydrunas Ilgauskas , CLE

15.6

-0.8292

Tony Parker , SAS

18.9

-0.2369

Mike Bibby , SAC

21.1

0.1580

Rasheed Wallace , DET

15.1

-0.9190

Troy Murphy , GSW

14.0

-1.1164

Andre Miller , DEN

13.7

-1.1703

Kirk Hinrich

15.9

-0.7754

So if you're still confused, in a nut shell all a Z-score is, is a standarized, relative score. The scoring champion Kobe Bryant obviously has the highest Z-score for PTS, and Ben Wallace the lowest, because he had the lowest amount of PPG.

We convert to the Z-score so we can do the same for all other 9 stats and add them together. This statistical analysis gives you the following rankings based on last seasons play:

Combined 10-category Z-scores

(Based on last season's per game stats)

Rank

Player

Z-Score

1

Shawn Marion , PHX

7.1205

2

Dirk Nowitzki , DAL

3.9213

3

Kevin Garnett , MIN

3.8833

4

Kobe Bryant , LAL

3.7346

5

Elton Brand , LAC

3.6053

6

LeBron James , CLE

3.1083

7

Ray Allen , SEA

2.9438

8

Steve Nash , PHX

2.2652

9

Gerald Wallace , CHA

2.1130

10

Gilbert Arenas , WAS

1.9895

11

Chauncey Billups , DET

1.3717

12

Michael Redd , MIL

1.2511

13

Rashard Lewis , SEA

1.0966

14

Allen Iverson , PHI

1.0804

15

Rasheed Wallace , DET

0.9263

16

Marcus Camby , DEN

0.7940

17

Chris Paul , NOK

0.5680

18

Andrei Kirilenko , UTA

0.5296

19

Antawn Jamison , WAS

0.4733

20

Lamar Odom , LAL

0.3690

21

Paul Pierce , BOS

0.2154

22

Mike James , TOR

0.1875

23

Dwyane Wade , MIA

0.1115

24

Brad Miller , SAC

-0.1114

25

Mike Bibby , SAC

-0.1552

26

Jason Richardson , GSW

-0.1601

27

Vince Carter , NJN

-0.1741

28

Tim Duncan , SAS

-0.1821

29

Jason Kidd , NJN

-0.3176

30

David West , NOK

-0.4502

31

Richard Jefferson , NJN

-0.8376

32

Chris Webber , PHI

-0.8962

33

Mehmet Okur , UTA

-0.9767

34

Tracy McGrady , HOU

-1.0683

35

Joe Johnson , ATL

-1.1092

36

Pau Gasol , MEM

-1.3180

37

Boris Diaw , PHX

-1.4023

38

Ming Yao , HOU

-1.4294

39

Kirk Hinrich

-1.4987

40

Chris Bosh , TOR

-1.6118

41

Carmelo Anthony , DEN

-1.7262

42

Jermaine O'Neal , IND

-2.1621

43

Troy Murphy , GSW

-2.4320

44

Ben Wallace , DET

-2.5922

45

Baron Davis , GSW

-2.6065

46

Zydrunas Ilgauskas , CLE

-3.1786

47

Tony Parker , SAS

-3.2061

48

Carlos Boozer , UTA

-3.3105

49

Dwight Howard , ORL

-3.7768

50

Shaquille O'Neal , MIA

-4.4651

51

Andre Miller , DEN

-4.4780

Ha! You see Kirk Hinrich at 39?! I knew he belonged. (Yes, there are other's you could add in who would probably crack the top 50, but not many). Other than that, we do have alot of surprises. For one, it confirms my belief that Dwyane Wade is the most overrated fantasy player in basketball. If you think about it, it makes sense, he provides mostly scoring, which is readily available among many players. He gives you some assissts and a decent FG%, but he has nothing to offer as far as 3-pointers, and as a guard he's limited in blocks and other big men stats.

The fact that Gerald Wallace cracked the top 10 shows the importance of guys who can really get Blocks and Steals. Since the totals for those stats aren't nearly as hight as points or other stats, the few guys who can average 2 or 3 a night are so much more valuable because they are so few players who available to give you that. It's a completely objective way to judge a player's true value to your team in all stats relative to other players around them.

Of course no stat is perfect; because it's based all on the previous year's stats, there's no accounting for a player's improvement or the potential for a breakout season, or inversely, the chance that a player is on the decline or a one season wonder. It also doesn't account for a coaching change or change in basketball philosphy, i.e., are they reeling it in, or making like the Pistons are doing and planning on running? That knowledge could make Billups even more valuable than he appears to be. Finally, the last drawback is there's no way to compare a rookie against the guys already in the league, so that's another judgement call for the manager.

Summary:
For the most part, the players who will have the biggest impact on your team will be the star players on top of the game; the ones who are in their prime and whose numbers will be fairly consistent from year to year. Because this pattern generally holds up, you can standardize the numbers to find their relative value, and add them together to find their complete value for a fantasy team. While you may have to make some emergency overrides in special cases, like rookies, up and coming/aging players, a new coach, the Z Rating works exactly to the point of fantasy sports. There is no intangible value for a fantasy player, just numbers. The Z Rating is based off of those very numbers. Keep in mind, it is you're team, so have fun with it. Add your favorite player to the list, especially if that player is as great as, say, Kirk Hinrich.

Brandon Tower lives in New Jersey but roots passionately for his favorite team the Chicago Bulls.